The shell is Python, which is good. However, instead of bundling the Gurobi libraries as a Python module that I can install alongside my system's native Python, they ship their own Python binaries. If I want to use any third-party modules I have to make them available to Gurobi somehow.

The Gurobi shell doesn't give me module docs, tab completion, or anything I'd get from either ipython or bpython. It's nothing more than the rudimentary cPython shell.

They do, however, provide a setup.py script, so we don't have to use gurobi.sh or the Python that's in the distribution. Here are simple instructions for using bpython as your shell. You should have Gurobi 5.0.1 installed and the GUROBI_HOME environment variable set. (I assume you are installing it into your home directory.)

This should require only two steps (assuming you already have Gurobi installed)...

> cd /opt/gurobi501/linux64> python setup.py install

I'd like to better understand one point...

"...instead of bundling the Gurobi libraries as a Python module that I can install alongside my system's native Python..."

We thought that this was what we were doing with 'setup.py'. Is there something we could have done to make it easier to install the gurobipy module in the system's Python? (BTW, we actually do use the native Python on Mac, but not on Linux. Python isn't really native on Linux - it is an optional package in most distributions.)